


i wish i was the monster that you think i am

by edeabeth



Category: American Horror Story
Genre: Alternate Universe, Cutting, F/M, Ghosts, Haunting, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-29
Updated: 2015-01-07
Packaged: 2018-03-04 02:13:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2905481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edeabeth/pseuds/edeabeth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She was pretty in a quiet sort of way, the way that usually left guys out of breath. /AU, If Violet was dead and Tate wasn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

.

Nights in White Satin

.

This will only be three or four chapters at the most. I’m just toying with the idea of Violet haunting Tate in an AU sort of thing, before he went so crazy. I mean, he’ll go crazy. But not at first.

.

_Nights in white satin, never reaching the end,_

_Letters I've written, never meaning to send._

_Beauty I'd always missed with these eyes before._

_Just what the truth is, I can't say anymore._

.

The summer was painfully hot, leaving him surrounded by dead grass and dusty blue skies. The Murder House stood out like a sore thumb against the lineup of cookie cutter houses that dotted the street neatly, the house a tragic monument of glittering windows and a sprawling lawn.

Tate had always liked the house when he was a child, sneaking into the attic and discovering boxes of belongings that were always like secrets. A stash of books and records in a battered trunk, fisherman sweaters folded neatly in a cardboard box. Nora would always ghost about, slipping through the hallways as the house unfolded to her every whim. He could even dimly recall the red haired maid slipping him cookies when his mother had turned her back.

Once his father had run away and left his sickening freak of a mother they’d been forced to leave. Another family moved in for a handful of months before finally moving out, one member short of what they had been. Eventually, after a long winter of emptiness, another family had bought the property.

His mother had been intrigued, her gaze constantly wandering the massive mansion with the dark hallways and shadowy corners. That had been the beginning, the slow buildup of delivering fresh baked goods and smiling sweet little smiles that dripped with venom. Eventually as Tate watched from the distance, his mother finally unraveled an entire family and left them smouldering in her wake.

His mother had boxed them all up and shipped them off towards the Murder House. Addy had been delighted, clapping her hands and spewing out long lines that were staggering in the hot dry air. Larry had only mindlessly smiled at her, barely glancing over his sister.

“Isn’t this lovely, Tate?” His mother crowed, lifting a small box from the truck. “Grab your things and pick out your room. We’re going to have a happy family here, you know.”

“Whatever.” He mumbled as he yanked up a heavy cardboard box that had his name printed out neatly on the side.

He had taken his old room, the bed still in the exact same place as it had been when he was a child. He set the box of books down on his bare mattress, casting a long glance over the empty the room. The ghosts would slowly come crawling out of the woodwork.

Birds chirped from outside the street. He ignored them as he slammed the door shut loudly. The four walls around him were darker than he remembered, and despite the proper cleaning procedures, he could still smell the smoke.

“Hey.”

He spun around only to find a girl standing behind him. “Who the fuck are you?”

“I live nearby.” She shrugged. “My name is Violet.”

 She stood just a little shorter than him, with long brown hair that hung over her shoulders. She was pretty in a quiet sort of way, the way that usually left guys out of breath. “I’m Tate. What are you doing in my room?”

Violet blinked. “Your room?” She paused, looking around at the empty bedroom, the lone box sitting on the mattress. “I’m just welcoming you to the neighborhood.”

“Thanks.” He said awkwardly, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Don’t let my mom see you. She’ll freak if a stranger in her perfect little house.” His words taste like acid. “So, yeah.”

She began gently searching through his box, lifting up old books and scanning the titles. “You have good taste, you now. Great Gatsby is good.” Violet wrinkled her nose as she looked at a thin copy of Catcher in the Rye. “I hated that book when I was younger.”

Tate had always adored Great Gatsby, remembering the woman from his childhood with her soft words and old stories. She used to tell him stories about speakeasies and when she was younger, how her world was lit up because of the Great War. “Schools banned that book. I always thought it was funny that something so trivial could get people worked up. It was fucking messed.”

Violet grinned bright. “Makes sense.”

“So where do you live?” He asked as he took out a small stack of books on birds and set them on the floor. The furniture would be brought up eventually from the moving truck.

“On the street.” She set the books down on his bed. “Anyways, I should get going. I’ll see you around.” Violet winked at him before slipping out of the room and into the hallway, shutting the door softly behind her.

Tate stood alone in his bedroom, surrounded by nothing and yet everything.

.

“I’ll tell you this, Miss Nora; you best leave my family alone. We’re going to live here in this house, whether you are satisfied or not.” Tate could hear his mother’s low voice slip through the hallways from the foot of the stairs. “You and your lot of dead freaks will not bother us, or I swear by the heavens I will bring a priest in here for an exorcism.”

Nora stood in her long pale dress, her fingers twisting the silk handkerchief into a worried knot. “You lock your baby away in the attic.” She mumbled, looking over the house. “Don’t the glass fixtures match my eyes?”

“You just keep away from us, will you?” His mother tone was like steel. “Don’t you go near my children. I will not tolerate them getting hurt.”

“Of course not, who would possibly wish to hurt a child?” Nora looked stunned, her expression filled with confusion.

“Well, you best keep your distance then.”

Tate crept further into the house away from the two women and towards the attic. He could hear his brother move about, his chain sliding across the floor. Addy was murmuring to herself in her bedroom, the walls painted bright pink and the entire room filled with ‘pretty girl’ decorations.

“Tate?” Larry stepped out of the bathroom, his hair still wet from his shower. “What are you doing still up? It’s gotten late.”

He shrugged. The house felt warm in the summer heat, the night barely cooling off the excessive warmth.

“Hey. What’s going on buddy?”

“Don’t call me that.”

He turned on his heel and slipped down the back staircase, ignoring Larry’s persistent calling. The servant’s stairwell was filled with cobwebs and dust, leaving footprints behind in his descent. “Fuck them all.” Tate mumbled, lightly slapping his hand against the wall. “I’m sick of those fuckers.” The stairwell led into the kitchen which he promptly left, sneaking out of the house and into the sprawling yard.

The yard was overgrown with clumps of trees and thick grass that crunched beneath his bare feet, the grass transformed into a burnt brown mess. Further away from the house was a thick cluster of trees that would shield him away from any of the windows. The remains of a structure stood still, vines growing rampant around it. Tate pulled out a carton of cigarettes but didn’t take one out. Instead, he just sat on the ledge of the structure, swinging his legs idly.

“Damn, it’s hot out.” Violet spoke softly, drifting out from the darkness. “I can never sleep in the summertime.”

He jumped slightly, unaware of her presence. “Don’t you ever go home?”

“Why? Sick of me already?” Violet grinned sharply at him. “My parents are busy right now. So I figured I would come over and say hey.” She paused, tossing her hair over shoulder. “So, hey.”

Tate rolled her eyes. “You might be the sanest person I’ve met here today.” He offered her a cigarette which she accepted without hesitation.

“That’s not saying much.” Violet informed him blandly, lighting the white cancer stick. “So, what’s your story?”

The neighborhood was silent; all around them was the still darkness of night. Not even a cool breeze rustled through the trees, but rather just a painfully suffocating heat that made simply existing painful. “Not much to tell.” Tate paused before running a hand through his hair. “I like birds.”

They sat together, straddling the ledge and facing each other. Violet looked different in the moonlight, her face paler and hair darker. “I like birds to. It must be nice to fly away, you know? There’s so much bullshit here, the way people act. I’m sick of it. I’d kill to be anywhere but here.”

He exhaled sharply. “I hate my mom. She’s a cocksucker. Literally. Larry had a family, you know. Except she wanted to get back into this place so she ruined them.”

“His wife lit herself on fire, and her children, didn’t she?”

“Yeah. It’s sickening.”

Violet watched the smoke drift in the air, twirling slightly in the night. “I hate people like that. My dad had an affair with a nineteen year old. It ruined my parents. Except my mom was so weak she couldn’t just make him leave. It was fucking bullshit.”

“Are your parents still together?”

“Nah.” She tilted her head back slightly. “My dad sent my mom away to an asylum. She kept raving on about seeing things, and it made her go mental. My dad got sick of dealing with it, so he just sent her away.” Violet’s eyes looked hard in the dark. “That’s what he does to broken people. He just ships them away when he gets tired of dealing with their shit.”

Tate looked away. “That blows.”

“Yeah.”

They sat together in silence, watching the night blur into day.

.

“Tate! Don’t you have school, young man?” His mother’s shrill voice flooded his room. She stormed over the windows and snapped the curtains open.

“It’s the middle of the fucking summer.” He groaned out from the tangle of sheets and blankets, flopping over and burying his face in the pillow. “Get the fuck out of my room.”

She jerked on the covers. “You do not take that tone with me.”

“You’re fucking drunk. Get out of my room!” Tate shouted. “Go away!”

Larry knocked sharply on the door. “Honey, what are you doing? Shouldn’t you leave Tate alone? It is the summer holidays, you know.” He looked confused, brow furrowed at the screaming between the two.

“This boy has no manners.” She flung her loose silk scarf over her neck, staggering closer to the bed. “He’s so goddamn perfect, but he just bathes in his own irksome dissatisfaction.”

“You did just wake him up now, come on. Darling, why not you take a nice long bath and I’ll cook you breakfast?”

His mother waved a hand in his direction. “I’ll have you know, boy, that this house has darkness in it. She haunts the halls, trying to rip out our joy from our lives. Don’t fall victim to it. She’ll rip your heart out for her own happiness.” Her makeup from the day previous was smudged, making her eyes look wild and frantic as they bore into him.

Tate gave her a thin smile, kicking off the blankets that had wrapped themselves around his ankles. “I know. Her name is Constance.”

She screamed wordlessly at him before flinging herself out the room, howling at the noise from the attic.

“Bitch.” He smirked as he flopped back onto his bed with one hand stretching out towards his CD player that sat on the bedside table. The Ramones played loudly, drowning out the shouting from his mother and his sister’s upset screeches.

.

The mirror revealed the damage. His black eye looked darker in contrast to his pale skin. “Bastards,” he spit out as he slammed his hand against the countertop. He slipped out a razor from his stash that he kept hidden under the bathroom mat, anxiously dragging it across his wrist. “Fucking pricks.”

“You know if you want to kill yourself you should shut the door.” Violet drawled from behind him, stepping into the bathroom and shutting the door herself. “Also, cut vertical. Can’t stitch it up then.”

Tate spun around, automatically shielding his bloodied wrist from view. “The hell are you doing here?”

She perched herself on the edge of the bathtub. “Doing my thing. Saying hey.”

“What do you want?”

Violet looked confused at his split lip and black eye. “I’m assuming whoever did that to you looks ten times worse, right?”

Tate snorted as he grabbed a rag and wiped at the blood. "Of course. They're such pricks, you know. I'm not even doing anything, and they just fucking jump me because they can." He feels so much anger that it burns him. "My mom is making me do summer school. She thinks I'm up to no good, so every fucking morning she sends me off to that stupid school with those freaking morons."

“Let me guess. You go to Westfield, don’t you?” He nodded. “Yeah. They love attacking anyone who doesn’t match up to their standards. Westfield sucks.”

“Yeah. You used to go?”

She grimaced. “Yep. It was a joke. Place blows.”

“Wanna go to my room? We can listen to music?”

Violet grinned as she stood up from where she had been seated. “You better have good taste. I swear, if you’re one of those pop freaks, I’m out of here.” She paused, frowning sharply. “Please tell me you don’t like the Beatles.”

.

They listen to the Hole, looping songs over again and again. They’re sprawled out on the ground playing with a deck of battered playing cards, oversized mugs of lemon tea. “I loved this place when I was younger. We lived here once before, but then after my dad ran away without me we had to move.”

Addy walks down the hall, chirping meaningless phrases to herself.

“Your dad left?”

“Yeah. I can’t blame him though. My mom’s insane. She freaked at me this morning. You should have seen her, ranting and raving. Drunker than hell. Wish he had taken me with him though. I’d kill to get out of this nightmare.”

Violet begins sorting through his mess of CDs, searching for something different. “I can’t believe how stunted your stash is. Do you only listen to Nirvana?” She switched the disc, playing a Morrissey album. “Your mom sounds nuts. Is she always this high strung?

Tate snorted. “You have no idea. She’s making me see some therapist to ensure that I won’t blow her brains out.” He looked over his cards. “Do you have any eights?”

“Fuck you.” She threw the card at him.

He winked. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

Violet grinned, tossing her hand of cards down. “Wouldn’t you like to know.” She poked him the side and made him jump. “Have you heard about the stories yet?”

“What stories?”

She grinned wickedly with sharp teeth. “Everyone who’s died in this house is trapped here.”

Tate remembers being a child and Nora, her slim fingers running through his messy hair. Sometimes at night the house makes loud noises, wood moaning and creaking. His mother ranting at the house spirit, how he feels watched when he wanders in the basement. “How many people have died here?” He’s never really believed in ghosts, a small defiance to his mother’s devotion to wage a silent war with the chances of the dead creeping about.

“Lots.”

.

Doctor Harmon sits rigid and face pale. “Your mother is worried about you, Tate.”  His eyes were haunted with dark shadows, telltale signs of insomnia unfolding across his face.

Tate hates the way he scribbles random nonsense in the thick pad of paper that sits on his knee, a fancy pen glinting in the dim light. “Didn’t know therapists did house calls. Does that cost extra, or something?” He detests the room they’re seated in, with the fancy couches that feel slippery to the touch and towering shelves filled with encyclopaedias.

“Do you want to talk about your relationship between you and your mother?”

He shrugged. “She’s a bitch. What else is there to say?”

 “Quite a few people have difficulties with their parents. Being an adult can be a challenging thing sometimes. I’m sure your mother is only trying to do what she feels is best for your wellbeing.” Doctor Harmon informed him, tone filled with restlessness. “Have you two gotten into any arguments as of late?”

“Yeah. She sucked some guy’s cock, and drove his wife to burn her and her daughters alive. Now they’re dead because my mom is such a bitch.”

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Your mother had nothing to do with that accident. I cannot explain exactly the events that took place here, but surely you don’t actually believe your mother had anything at all to do with that. Those deaths were something different all together.”

“No, it’s because my mom couldn’t keep herself from wrecking a family.”

Tate had a feeling his mother was listening from behind the door. He hoped she was. He hoped his words stung her and made her regret. The idea of her crying made him feel satisfied. “There’s so much pain, you know. So much fucking pain, and it ruins people. It turns people into monsters, and all I want to do is kill them. I want to crush their skulls and slit their wrists before they can hurt others. My mother is a bitch who only wants to fucking better herself, no matter who she hurts.”

“Tate-” the doctor began but he only cut him off.

He leaned forward in his chair. “You aren’t looking to hot right now, doc. Maybe you should go take a nap and get out of my face.”

.

_But we decide_

_Which is right_

_And_

_Which is an Illusion_

.


	2. swelling

.

Swelling

.

I made a horrifyingly embarrassing blunder. I make a big statement many times in the first chapter about how this story takes place in the summer, and yet in the cutting scene I mention he’s been going to Westfield where he got attacked with the male version of Leah. So, I fixed it so he’s going to summer school. Sorry about that.

Also, while Tate knows that Nora is a ghost, he isn’t quite aware of the other ghosts. Or he is, but he refuses to believe in it the way his mother does. He is slowly accepting that the house is evil though, and he does use it to his advantage.

Also, this chapter covers the remains of summer and goes up the Halloween.

*Chelsea smile is an ‘altered’ smile that is carved into faces, like the Joker from Batman for example.

.

_Are you're trying to tell me_

_something with your eyes?_

_All I wanna do now_

_is lay down and die._

.

The house is alive, he finally understands.

At night it whispers, voices tangling up inside his skull and making him see a river of corpses in his dreams. Sometimes he catches sight of two little girls running around the house, skin flaking into ashes and leaving behind the horrible smell of burning flesh. Sometimes they laugh at him, peeking around corners and eyes glowing like embers from the darkness of closets. Other times he sees Nora the way he once did when he was a child, gliding through the corridors and searching for something.

The maid frightens him, the way she looks at him with one dead eye. He isn’t sure is she’s alive or not, but understands that his mother loathes her. She doesn’t do a very good job cleaning, occasionally smashing plates in gleeful fits of rage and leaving the floor soaking wet for his mother to slip on. Tate can’t help but appreciate her to a small degree, watching her try to find new ways for his mother to crack open her skull.

Larry still pretends that they’re a perfect little family, the pretty wife and the handsome son, and unfortunately the handicapped mistakes. Tate hates the way he tries, how he starts up conversations that only sputter and die in the end.

Part of him wants to take the butcher knife from the kitchen and drive it through his mother’s chest, right where her heart should be.

.

Someone at the door knocks which makes him curious. His mother has no actual friends, and Larry is far to mind numbingly dull to have any acquaintances that would actually want to drop by for a visit. He creeps to the edge of the staircase, watching the door from his perch above as his mother sashays to the door, Moira conveniently nowhere nearby.

“Hello.” She greets the person, her voice shrill with surprise. “And who might you be?”

“I’m Violet.”

Immediately Tate lurched to his feet, starting down the stairs as quietly as he could. It was Saturday morning and he hadn’t had to go to Westfield for the summer school program. “Beautiful weather, isn’t it?” His mother replies and he could only imagine her confusion at the girl on her doorstep.

The weather had been much nicer, he noticed. At some point through the night it had rained, making the vegetation seem so much less depressing than it had before in its burnt state. The sky was a cloudy sort of blue and the sun didn’t feel so hot against his skin. They’d only been living in the Murder House for a little over a week, the house slowly shuffling itself into a state that could be considered organized. Addy’s dolls were lined up neatly on her shelf and his mother’s jewelry tucked away inside boxes safely. Larry had bought Beau a bright red ball to appease him earlier, something that had brought the boy a loud desire to play with anyone who would.

“Can I see Tate?” Violet’s voice sounds surprisingly bland, drifting into the house. His mother stands at the door, blocking his view of seeing her. “I go to Westfield with him.”

“I don’t think my son wants to be seeing people,” she sniffed delicately. “such as yourself. You understand, don’t you?”

“Hey,” he greets her, stepping closer and forcing his mother to step to the side. “What’s up?”

She’s wearing a faded floral print dress that hangs a little short on her narrow frame and has covered herself in an oversized cardigan. The ends of her one sleeve look like they’re fraying, and she’s wearing a pair of old converse that had seen better days at one point. His mother is watching her like she’ll spread germs over the threshold of her perfect house, and Tate loves how she looks simply not perfect.

Violet looks different from the girls from school, all in jean miniskirts and crop tops. He thinks he prefers girls like this, looking perfectly disheveled with their long brown hair and wide eyes.

She gave him a glossy smile. “I thought we could hang, since school was out for the weekend.”

“Come on.” He nods up the stairs, silently inviting her into the house. “I’ve got a new Morrissey album we can listen to.”

“What one moment, will you.” His mother smiles at him her teeth. “I don’t recall you ever mentioning that you made a friend, have you?”

Tate gave her a blank look. “Why would I tell you?”

Violet slipped past his mother and followed him up the stairs smirking. “It was nice meeting you.” She tossed over her shoulder, words filled with contempt. “God, she’s a bitch.” She whispered to Tate as they reached the second floor. “I can’t believe you have to deal with her every day without cracking.”

“How do you know I haven’t?” He asks as he invites her into his room silently. It’s surprisingly neat, the bed made and his collections of music and books tidied. Moira had slipped in earlier to do her job, and he’s confused at the fact that she actually _did_ her job. “You think she’s bad, Larry is worse. He’s an idiot just letting himself get screwed. I hate people like that. No backbone. Nothing. They just let themselves get used for nothing.”

She snorts, flopping down on the floor on her stomach with her ankles crossed in the air. Violet rested her chin on her hands, looking up at him. “Has he asked you to call him dad yet?”

He tosses himself down next to her, lying on his back and looking up at the ceiling. “He asked my sister earlier.” The house is whispering things to him, sickening words that make him want to slice his wrists open and _stop_. “This place is a goddamn horror show.”

“You gotta admit though,” she laughs softly. “This house has soul.”

.

Tate looks up from the book he was reading, his fingers neatly bending the corner of the page down. It was a habit of his that his mother loathed, along with the cheap appearance of his books that had come second hand. She always hated the way they looked next to her own books, with their red spines and golden titles.

Violet is lying on his bed with her feet dangling off, listening to the music with her eyes shut. For a second he think she’s fallen asleep, with how still she looks but then he catches sight of the faint movement of her left foot, barely tapping away to the beat of the music washing over her.

Tate quietly got up from the floor and sat on the bed next to her, unsure of where to actually sit. It feels strange, a pretty girl lying on his bed. “I’m surprised you knocked for once. Doesn’t that go against your code of blatantly ignoring social standards?”

Her eyes open. “I figured I was going to give you a heart attack if I kept sneaking around, and then you would die and wouldn’t that just be a shame?”

“At least I could haunt you for eternity, you know.”

She grins at him, her hair looking like silk as it falls around her neck. “You could try.”

Tate would like to, he thinks. Right now all he wants to do is simply kiss her, run his fingers through her soft hair and pull her closer. He doesn’t though, because he doesn’t want to ruin her yet.

Not yet, anyways.

.

She leaves a little before midnight, but at the same time he doesn’t think she’s really left.

.

He goes to bed a little after one in the morning, and he wakes up in the backyard with the moon full in the sky. There’s blood all over his hands and a dead cat lying just a few feet away with its legs broken and looking mangled. _You did this you did this you did this_ runs through his mind again and again, burning itself to his skull.

Tate doesn’t really know what to do, but instead just lies there in the dirt and blood, feeling disgust overwhelming him. He doesn’t quite understand how it could have happened, because he remembers still going to bed with the bright red numbers of his alarm clock glaring at him. How the house creaked slightly before he finally gave into the waves of sleep.

The house looks dark in the night, the windows empty and the air still. He wonders if Addy is asleep and sharp stab of guilt is driven into his chest, remembering her affection for cats.

He starts crying.

.

 _Do it do it do it do it do it do it do it_ what is he doing?

.

“Are you scared of anything?” He asked her one day, poking her arm lightly.

She’s nose deep in one of his books, barely looking up at him with her dark eyes. “No.”

.

He finds her sitting on the edge of the tub in the bathroom slicing open her wrist with one of his razors. She looks up at him briefly before continuing on, making carefully horizontal cuts across her skin. “Someone hasn’t been sleeping.” She notices, her tone sounding distant as blood bubbles up from her cuts. Her skin looked paler than usual, eyes dark and hazed. “What’s going on with you?”

“Thought you were supposed to cut vertical?” He asks as he runs cold water from the tap and shoves his hand beneath the flow. It burns the way cold water shouldn’t, but all he wants to do is just stop feeling the blood on his hands.

Violet looks up, halting her movements. “I don’t want to die right now.” Her expression looks oddly betrayed and for a second it looks like she’s become something translucent. “Do you?”

He grins at her from the mirror. “Always.”

They become silent, nothing more than the steady rush of water between them. His skin eventually bleeds and she’s already bleeding out. After a couple of minutes he becomes concerned with how much blood she’s already lost and how lost she looks sitting there biting her lip and peeling apart her skin. “You like looking at me.” She informs him quietly, her voice sounding surprisingly quiet.

She doesn’t sound the way she should be, tone explosive with sarcasm and sharp remarks. Right now he feels like he’s undressed her and watching her in her most vulnerable state. “You’re pretty.” He replies, sitting down on the edge of the tub beside her, his hands stinging from the roughness of his scrubbing. “I like pretty things.”

She swallows, holding her mutilated wrist up. “I like broken things. Things people don’t care about.”

“Someone should.”

Violet rested her head on his shoulder, body feeling like ice next to his own. “Do you believe in heaven, Tate? That if you and I died, we would go there?”

He looks at her, her thick eyes lashes and the plastic buttons of her dark blue cardigan with the sleeves pulled up. The rips on her tights, the bright red blood on her wrist. “I think you would go to heaven. Good people should go.” He can’t really imagine heaven. Every time he tries, he thinks of the burners in the kitchen turned on and the dead cat, maddening thoughts snarling together in his skull. “You’re better than me, Violet.”

She gave him a ghost of a smile, pressing her lips to the corner of his mouth. “I should go.”

.

“Your mother tells me you’ve been sleep walking, Tate.” Doctor Harmon informs him, sitting in the exact same place as before and in the same way. Rigid and uncomfortable. He stills looks tired, unshaven and restless. Summer is fading into autumn, leaves looking yellow in the fading light.

His statement surprises him. He never really thought of himself wandering the house in the sleep, but it does solve the gap between when he went to bed and when he woke up in the backyard with some other slaughtered animal in his hands. “Is that a problem?”

“It could be. You could do something dangerous in your sleep without realizing it. Your mother said you’ve been turning on the burners to the stove. You’re concerning her, Tate.”

He snorts. “Nah, she just doesn’t want the house to burn down in her sleep.”

Doctor Harmon rubbed his cheek irritably. “That is a reasonable concern, don’t you think?”

Tate shrugged, lifting his hands up casually. He tries to imagine the house burning down, skeletal remain of a structure emerging from the ashes. His mother and Larry burning in their bed, the way they should. It’s a nice thought, one that makes him wants to smile and actually light the damn house on fire. “I really don’t care about my mom, to be honest.”

“Alright, then. Why don’t you tell me about your dreams then? Can you recall any of them?”

He grinned sharply at the doctor. “Yeah, actually. Do you really want to hear them?”

“Yes.”

Tate pauses before speaking. He forces his expression blank. “I kill everyone, and it’s beautiful. I slice open their necks and they bleed, and it’s like I’m saving them from the freak show that we’re living in. I see the kids from school, kids I don’t even know. I don’t care. I just kill them, smash their skulls against the floor and leave them to rot. They’re all dying, and it’s like I’m saving them.”

The doctor scribbles down notes on his thick pad of paper, and Tate hates that. He hates the way he picks and choses at what Tate says that could be potentially important and what isn’t. “Do you ever kill someone in your dreams that you care about?”

He doesn’t always dream of death.

“There’s this girl.”

Tate dreams of Violet sometimes, in her ripped up tights and floral dresses that hang just a little above the knee. In his dreams she’s never sad, but looks vibrant. Sometimes she laughs, or sometimes she tells him stories that never make sense but he tries to hang onto each of her words before they fade away entirely.

Doctor Harmon looked surprised, leaning forward in his leather chair. “You’re seeing someone?” Tate could imagine the conflict of worry running through the man’s mind, the idea that a fuckup like himself would be enticed by some girl. The man was probably already concerned for her wellbeing.

“Sorta.”

“I think that’s a good thing to do. You could benefit from the social interaction.”

Tate frowns at the man. “She’s a virgin, you know. Virgins get wet so easily.” Tate doesn’t actually know if Violet is a virgin, but he’d like to imagine that she was untouched. He feels satisfied at the look of revulsion that flickers across Doctor Harmon’s face, clings to it. “She looks like she’ll be a good lay.”

Doctor Harmon ended the session at that, letting himself easily out the front door.

.

Violet is always close by it seems. Sometimes he finds her smoking in the backyard by the trees where it’s harder to spot from the house or other times she’s in his bedroom listening to his music playing on a loop. Occasionally she’ll knock on the door, making his mother scowl and criticise the moment she’s gone. He doesn’t really understand how she keeps sneaking into the house, ghosting up the stairs and avoiding the inhabitants easily.

Tate keeps her away from his family, but in the end she discovers them.

Larry had stuck his head into Tate’s room carelessly one afternoon, just a week before school started. Summer school had been finished already, leaving him with nothing to do but lounge about in his room, occasionally brushing up against Violet.

He had found the two lying on his bed together, the Ramones playing softly in the background. “Who’s this, Tate?” He had asked pleasantly, his expression revealing unbridled curiosity. Violet’s pale legs were bare, her dress daringly short.

“Violet.” He replied shortly, not even glancing up from his book as irritation seized him. Violet was sitting close, her head resting on his shoulder as she looked up from her own book, eyes dark. She gave him a smile filled with teeth.

Larry entered the room, making Tate put down his book and straighten up on his bed, his arm slipped around Violet’s waist tightly. “You’ve never introduced us before.”

“That’s because you’re a sleaze.” Tate replied coolly, recalling the times he’d seen the man watching the little girls who lived next door with their short dress and bare skin. “What do you want?”

He looks horrified with his statement. “Now, I don’t know where you got that idea from but we do not talk like that in this household. As the man in this house, you will obey what I say.”

Violet slithered out from Tate’s grip and off the bed, wandering closer to the man. He smiled at her pleasantly. “Do you like children, mister?” She asked him softly, cocking her head slightly at him. “My mother did. She had a baby that she adored. I hated him. I put a pillow over him and made him go to sleep. I sung a little song.” Her voice sounded odd, like her words were drawn out and floating. Larry looked horrified, his expression grey and gaping. “There’s something wrong with my mind, you see. That’s why they couldn’t lock me up. Did you ever hear about it? They called me the Monster from Boston.”

Larry stumbled to leave the room, slamming the door loudly in his wake. Violet laughed loudly, tilting her head back. “Did you actually?” He asked, seating aside his book carelessly.

“Would it matter?” Violet blinked at him.

He paused for a moment, thinking if it really did. “Not really.”

“My mom had a miscarriage before we moved here from Boston. I never killed anyone.” Tate could tell she was telling the truth, but at the same time it sounded too twisted to be true.

.

“Why can’t we ever go to your place?” He asked her once and only once.

Violet had been sorting through his collection of music searching for a song she liked. “My dad’s an asshole. We didn’t really get along so I just stopped trying.”

They never talked about it again.

.

It’s a dog this time, with a black collar around his neck.

Tate can’t stop crying.

.

Voices start echoing in his head. Sometimes he imagines he sees his father in the reflection of his mirror, watching his with sad eyes and a longing expression, but every time Tate turns around the man disappears. Sometimes he hears laughter ringing through the house, footsteps above him when no one should be in the house but Beau and him.

He screams sometimes, when his family isn’t around to hear him howl and rage. He cuts deeper into his skin, marking up his wrists and legs without a care.

It takes him a second to realize that he’s finally cracking. That the house is speaking to him.

.

“That girl is a menace.” His mother hisses over the dinner table, her eyes looking bright in the candle light. Addy watches curious, smiling faintly at Tate. Larry serves himself a large helping of whatever it is his mother had made for dinner, Tate turning down him offer of filling his plate mutely. “I do not want you to be associating yourself with her any longer, do you understand me?”

Tate grinned. “Does she scare you?”

“She just admitted to murder! Have you killed all your brain cells with that ruckus you call music yet?” She spoke shrilly, her hand latching onto the arms of the chair tightly. “I will not tolerate this twisted friendship anymore.”

He rolled his eyes. “She was joking. Larry was pissing us off coming into our room like that. He wasn’t going away, so you can calm down.” Tate then glared at the man. “Have you even looked up what she supposedly admitted? It was just a joke, Jesus Christ.”

“I do not like the way she gallivants around in those short dresses, attracting all those stares.” His mother steamrolled on, barely pausing. “I’ve seen the way you look at her, her bare legs indecent! She’s a she devil, and you will keep away from her. I will not permit you to be associating with that little witch.”

“No! I won’t!” He jumped up from the table, slamming his hands down hard on the surface. “Violet it my friend. She’s the only good thing about living here! I fucking hate this dump. I like her, and I’m not going to stop hanging out with her just because you don’t think it matches up to your fucked up standards.”

His mother narrowed her eyes. “What on earth could you possibly like about her? What could you two have in common?”

Tate gave her a ghost of a smile. “She likes birds.”

.

He hates the first days of anything, really.

He hates the first day of school the most.

It’s repulsively bland, people running around in new shoes and expensive shirts and throwing themselves in other people’s faces. The girls at his school like to dress up in pretty dresses with the buttons half done up and their skirts pulled up higher than the dress code permitted. Everyone was eager to display themselves, a jock and a cheerleader sucking face just outside the front doors to the building. He hates everyone.

For the first little while he searches. He doesn’t know for sure whether or not Violet still goes to Westfield, but he hopes she does. He feels loneliness curling up inside the hollows of his bones, anxiety rushing through his veins and turning his blood to ice. If he could find her, she’d say something sarcastic and cutting to the gothic girl, something about how she’s only looking for attention. He could imagine her smoking like a dragon, little white cancer stick hanging loosely in her grip.

He never finds her, but he does find Joey. Or Joey finds him, out behind the school.

“Freak. Murder House Freak.” He taunts, grabbing hold of his arm and leering in his face. “Whatcha doing back here? Looking for your balls?”

Tate glowered, wanting to snap his neck. “Get off of me.”

All throughout summer school he had tolerated the jock’s presence, allowed him to lash out and drive him into the ground, his fists leaving a rainbow of bruises across his chest.

“What’s it like sleeping where a bunch of dead people slept?” Joey continued, slamming him against the brick wall roughly. His head hurts from where it connects with the brick, making him cry out sharply. The pain stings but it helps clear his mind.

_Do it do it do it do it._

“You do cocaine, don’t you?” He grins at him, widening his eyes slightly the way Violet did to Larry. “I can get you better stuff, you know. My dad has his own on the side business that he runs. If you want in. He won’t notice if some of it goes missing.”

Joey looks at him hard.

“Where the fuck is your stash?”

“Back at my house. Wanna skip?”

.

They skip.

.

“Why’s it down here?” Joey demanded as he followed him cautiously further into the shadowy basement. The place was a dark mess of cobwebs and boxes of junk that had been left by previous owners. “You better not be messing with me, freak. I’ll cut your throat if you try anything funny.”

“Shut up.” Tate replied, leading him further down the stairs. Larry had gone to work before Tate had left for school, Addy and his mother going shopping for the day. They were alone and the house knew it, guiding the two further and further into the shadows. “No one looks for it down here.”

He knows this is wrong but he doesn’t care anymore. He’s been violated again and again by the house, it whispering terrible secrets and luring him in his sleep. Violet doesn’t know how far gone he’s become-how he trembles when he finds grass stains on the knees of his jeans and blood beneath his nails. Violet can’t save him from himself.

“Swear, I will fucking ruin you if this isn’t top notch stuff. You better not try to bullshit me, you little freak.”

He ignores him, ushering into the room that’s the coldest in the house. There’s nothing but a chair and emptiness. Joey falls silent, standing still as the door slams shut behind him, Tate sliding by easily and throwing himself into the chair. The house is almost screaming around him, sounding like chains snapping and bullets being fired and matches being struck. He feels comfortable in the chair, slouching forward casually as he watched his antagonist gape at him.

_Do it do it do it-_

“Where is the stuff?” Joey’s voice wavers in the space between them. “You know what, fuck you.” He tries to leave but the door won’t open.

“You hit me because I was different, right?” Tate asks, resting his chin on his palm. He feels bored, watching the boy struggle with the door. “I mean, why else? I didn’t do anything to you. I didn’t do anything to anyone. I just wanted to be left alone.”

The pipes in the house groaned.

“Yeah, you were different.” Joey gestured to the differences in their clothing. His brand new shirt and jeans compared to the scuffed versions he had purchased from the thrift store downtown. “Listened to that weird ass music and always acting like you were better than the rest of us.”

“And different is bad, right?”

Tate slowly stands up from his seat, striding towards the boy as he fumbles for a reply. He doesn’t give him a chance before he decks him, feeling the bruising force on his knuckles. _Do it do it do it do it._

Joey’s crumpled up at his feet, trembling. The image makes power surge through his veins, filling him with sheer pride and satisfaction. The house is coming alive all around him which makes his skin tingle and eyes burn in the dim light of the basement. “Joey?” He asked softly, kneeling down and looking at the boy in the eye, feeling joy at how he was crying at his feet.

“W-what?”

Tate smiles brightly at him. “You should have left me alone.”

_Do it do it do it do it do it do it DO IT!_

He flicks the light off and all he can hear is the screaming.

.

Joey goes flying out of the room, the door swinging open at Violet’s touch. “What the fuck did you do to him?” She shouted at him, watching him as if he’d hit her. As if he’d turn out the lights on her and let her be ripped apart.

“That was the guy who’s been attacking me all summer.” He informs her blankly, confused at how guarded she seems. “I fixed it.”

She isn’t laughing the way he thought she would, not even smiling. She looks horrified at the blood on the ground. “How could you do this? How could you hurt anyone like this?”

He kicked the chair violently, watching it fall onto its side. “What are you talking about? I fixed it. I didn’t just give in and let him beat me up all over again. I took a chance, and it’ll work. That bastard will never hurt anyone ever again.”

“The house is getting into your mind, isn’t it? It’s twisting you. God, Tate. You can’t let this place break you apart. You can’t hurt others like this.” Violet whispered, bringing her hands up to her forehead and shutting her eyes. “This place will only fucking destroy you. I can’t watch this happen.”

She turned on her heel and walked away, the darkness of the basement swallowing her. “I THOUGHT YOU WEREN’T AFRAID OF ANYTHING!” Tate howled, pain stabbing his heart again and again.

.

Tate feels like she’s everywhere, always watching him. He searches for her, looking in the bathroom and wandering out by the trees hoping he’ll stumble across her smoking and lounging in the long grass. He can never quite find her, but he imagines he can still hear her listening to Morrissey and playing solitaire. He’s depressed, something his mother has picked up on and noted to Doctor Harmon about.

“How have things been, Tate?” The man asks, not even looking at him when he throws himself down on the seat across from him. “I haven’t seen you in a while. Things must have been busy. How has school been for you?”

“Fine.” He grinds out, his hands clenching in fists. He feels anger seizing him; rocking through his body and making him bite his tongue. He thinks about the thing in the monster that had tore at Joey, dragging his claws across his face and lurching onto the struggling teen. How it screamed, how Joey had screamed. How Tate had enjoyed it.

He looks frustrated, waiting for a response that’ll explain something. He’d never gotten one word answers from Tate in previous therapy sessions. “Your mother says you aren’t eating anymore. That you’ve been quieter. What’s been going on?”

Tate shrugged.

The doctor sighed. “You got to tell me something here.” He paused. “What’s been happening with that girl you mentioned last time?”

He looked at his battered boots. “She’s mad at me.”

“Why’s that?” The man jotted down a quick note onto the piece of paper, his eyes never once leaving Tate’s face. He looks anxious to know if he hit her or held her to a wall, forcing himself upon her. Except, he never tried to hurt her.

She hurt him though.

Tate swallowed, slouching in his seat. “I did something she didn’t like.”

He had been defending himself, and yet she threw in his face as if he had been wrong. As if he was something vile and worth her contempt, when all he did was _not give in. (except, didn’t he?)_

“Did you hurt her?”

“NO!” Tate shouted, jumping to his feet. “I didn’t do anything!”

Doctor Harmon raised his hands slowly. “Relax. Just sit down, and let’s discuss this.” He set aside his pad of paper. “You never mentioned her name, you know.”

He gave him a faint smile. “Violet.” Her name sounds like violate in the way his sounds like taint.

“I’m afraid we’ll have to end the session for the day.” All of the colour in his face had been drained, making him look so much older than he should have. “Goodbye, Tate.” The man slowly stood up from his chair, gathering up his fancy pen and his papers. “I’ll see you next week.”

.

In the end she does return, sitting on the edge of his bed with her hands folded neatly in her lap. He shuts the door softly, afraid that the noise might ruin it. That she might take off again, running up the stairs and away from him. Except she doesn’t this time, just instead watches him with hazed eyes that reminds him of early morning rain showers. “Hey.” She greets as he steps further into his bedroom.

“Hey.”

“Look.” She begins but stops, her hands clenching into fists as he waits patiently for her to speak when all he really wants to do is grab hold of her and never let go. “You don’t understand something about this house. It gets inside your head and it makes you rot. It ruins people, turns them into monsters. There is darkness inside this place, and it’ll never let you go.”

He sits down next to her slowly. “You don’t think I could resist it?”

“No, I don’t.” She tells him quietly, pulling at the ends of her oversized cardigan, a dusty purple colour looking flattering against her pale skin. “No one ever can, Tate. The darkness will make you crave it, make you do things you shouldn’t ever do.”

“Are you still mad at me? For what I did to that guy?”

She shook her head. “That guy was an asshole.” Violet’s expression looked distant, her hand inching closer to his. “I don’t want to lose you to this place, Tate. This place is a nightmare that you’ll never escape.”

“How do I keep this place from taking over me?” Tate asked her, squeezing her hand tightly, never wanting to let her slip away again. “Tell me, I’ll do anything.”

“I’ll fight for you.” Violet smiled softly at him. “I can wear the shining armour and fight the monsters. Just don’t give into this place. It’ll warp you into your worst qualities.”

“How do you know so much about this place?” Because he can’t stop wondering. The way she talks makes it sound like she knows how he wakes up surrounded by death into backyard with the scent of blood drowning his senses. How the voices in his head sounds like war drums rattling away, making him want to smash his fists against his reflection and watch himself break into a million pieces.

Violet winked at him. “I did my research.”

.

That night he dreams of a woman spread out on the dining room table, body sliced in half. Black curls fall around her neck, eyes bright and glittering as she tells him she’s going to be famous, does he know who she is? Eventually she starts asking for the doctor to see her, to fix her but he doesn’t understand her, doesn’t understand her Chelsea smile.

She turns to ash, leaving him tasting dust when he wakes up.

.

Violet does fight for him, curling up around him when he goes to sleep. Her arms were like iron, holding him still despite the persistent tugging of the house. The voices sounded quieter when she was near, her lips pressed to his neck and fingertips ghosting over his skin. He avoids the basement, avoids the tangles of shadows that coil together in the hallways.

She drifts through the house with him, her hand clenched in his own. Somehow his mother never catches sight of the two, oblivious to their presence. Larry avoids her, eyes glaring into the floorboards when they happen to cross paths. She hums an odd lullaby when they’re within his earshot to make Tate laugh, and he can’t stop wanting her.

She persistently knocks on the door, enjoying the satisfaction she gains from spoiling his mother’s better moods within a few short greetings. Eventually his mother leers in her face, drunken and mindlessly seeking to drive her away. “What do your parents think of you wandering over here, little Violet? Surely they’d want you to be close by, wouldn’t they?”

Tate flinches from her words, feeling the heat from the outdoors sneaking past his frigid mother guarding the door. “My mother went off her rocker, actually.” Violet informs her pleasantly, smiling thinly. She looks different that afternoon, her hair pinned up. “Hey, Tate.”

“Do you think it’s right to be spending so much time alone with a boy? Surely you have other friends, don’t you? A,” she faltered, “pretty girl like you must have plenty of girlfriends to be hanging about with your free time.”

“I did. They’re dead now, though.” Violet’s tone plummets to iciness.

There’s a deadly silence that grew between the two before his mother broke it, leaning closer to Violet.

“I don’t think you should be spending so much time with my son, luring him into temptation. Jesus H. Christ,” his mother swore, leaning heavily on the doorframe. “You flashing your bare legs at him and prancing around half naked. What the neighbours must think of my son. There is a time for decency!” She cried, striking her hand against the wood of the door.

“Mom, let her be.”

“You’re an indecent little bitch, you know. I won’t tolerate this association any longer!” Violet’s eyes were becoming harder than ice as she watched his mother continue her drunken tirade, saying nothing to defend herself.

Tate mouthed for her to go to the side door, watching Violet turn on her heel and stride away, flipping his mother off. “Go fuck yourself.” He mumbled, moving away from the front entrance.

She slammed the door shut. “I try so hard, to make you happy. But you shut yourself away, hating us all! What can I do to make you satisfied? Why can’t you just be perfect? Can’t you see?” Her face was flushed from the heat, hands trembling as she drew nearer and nearer. “I’m sick of you, the way you go about thinking you’re too good for this family.”

His mother slapped him hard, snapping his face to the side from the force of her hit. The house seemed to groan around them, floorboards creaking and pipes rattling. “Go hang yourself.” He spit at her, stalking away from her.

Tate waited long enough for her to slip into the sitting room with a glass of vodka before opening the door and letting Violet slip in quietly. Hand in hand they crept up the stairs, mindful of the stairs that creaked.

Eventually they stepped into his room where the spell of silence was broken. “She just called me indecent.” Violet stated calmly, brushing by him to browse through his growing assortment of CDs before settling on a Nine Inch Nails album. “While she was drunk at nine in the morning. That’s just hypocritical.”

“My mom’s a bitch.” Tate shrugged, watching her sway to the low sound of the music.

“She also hit you. Remind me to poison whatever the hell she drinks on my way out. Or maybe I’ll wander around the house naked, give her a heart attack. What do you think?” She questioned, lifting a brow in mock seriousness. Violet placed her hand gently on his face, inspecting the darkening bruise. “Damn, she was wearing rings to.”

Tate doesn’t care that his mother hit him; he doesn’t care about anything at the moment. Except for one thing. He spins her around so her back is against the wall, his mouth furiously pressed against her own. Eventually they break apart, breathing roughly. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to be so rough.”

Violet grinned wickedly at him, making the voices and nightmares dissolve into _nothing_. “Let’s be indecent together.”

.

_if you're gonna do it,_

_you better do it right-_

_or my heart won’t stop swelling._

.


	3. doll house

.

Dollhouse

.

I believe that this will be the last chapter to this story. It was only meant to be a brief mind screw, though I have been thinking up another story with a very different Harmon family moving in. But, whatever. After this I want to do a few more chapters for another story before even starting anything new.

Thank you to whoever has been reading this. I’ve had a fun time writing this alternate story because yeah, I obsess wildly over Tate and Violet together. I might make one more chapter, but I might not. Whatever.

(also, this chapter fought with me word for word so fuck this chapter.)

(happy new year’s!)

.

_Places, places, get in your places_

_Throw on your dress and put on your doll faces._

_Everyone thinks that we're perfect_

_Please don't let them look through the curtains._

_._

He dreams of a woman in a room bathed in sunlight playing the cello, dead babies surrounding her. She’s crying, black mascara and red blood running down her face. Eventually she drops the instrument, the bow clattering loudly against the bloodied ground. “Vivian,” someone called, the door to the room opening to reveal a smoky figure grasping the door knob. “They’re here for you.”

“You’re sending me away.” She whispered as she looked towards the dead children scattered around her. “I don’t understand what has happened anymore.”

“You’re sick. They’re going to help you, but you have to go with them.”

The woman sobbed. “I just want out of this house, you don’t even understand.”

The figure crept further into the room, stepping on the bloodied infants without realizing. “I do understand. You’re sick, and you need help.” He reached out his hazy hand and came close to brushing his hand against her shoulder before freezing. His arm dropped. “Think about our daughter.”

She scoffed. “She’s dying, you know. You think you know everything, but you can’t even see it.”

He grabbed her arm and hauled her up out of her chair. “She’ll be fine, but you have to go now. They’re going to take you to a hospital. Everything is going to be fine now, but right now you’re not stable. You need to leave, because you are ruining this family. Vivian, you’re losing it. You need help before you ruin your daughter more than you already have.”

Vivian crumbled into ashes, the cello bursting into flames and each of the dead little infants opening their blue eyes and howling in rage.

Tate woke up crying.

.

Violet looked at him from where she was painting her nails black. “You’re going to be fine.” She told him quietly. “Trust me.”

.

Tate liked smashing the pumpkins. He grinned when he crushed them with his heel and threw them against the walls, watching the orange shell split open and the seedy guts spilling over the porch steps everywhere. Violet watched from her perch just out of sight, hiding in the shadows of some large trees, looking bored as she watches him gleefully break his mother’s carved jack-o-lanterns and other untouched pumpkins. “Your mom will kill you if she finds out, you know.” She warned with her face tilted up at the warm sun burning bright in the sky. “Didn’t she spend all morning carving those and arranging them?”

“She’d have to catch me first.” Tate shrugged; launching one at the welcome mat and watching it explode at contact. “Face it. She’s too drunk anyways.”

Ever since they had moved in his mother had become more and more restless, lost in a drunken daze and lashing out violently. Larry was growing more and more frustrated with the falling apart family, trying to force his way further into their lives. “Whatever. Just don’t be stupid.” Violet murmured, fingers pulling at the green grass. “I like you alive, you know.”

He threw himself down next to her, instantly reaching out and pulling her closer to him. “When are we going out on a real date? I’m sick of this place.”

Violet looked at her beat up shoes before looking back at him. “Let’s go out tomorrow night. Halloween.”

The entire street was decorated with fake cobwebs and black paper cut out bats hung from the trees, bright orange pumpkins dotting the porch steps. Children were milling about in large bunches, shrieking about candy and costumes, filling the hot air with their thin excitement. “Won’t you be scared?” He teased her, running his fingers through her long brown hair. “Isn’t that the night when the monsters and ghosts walk the streets, blending in with the living?”

“I’m never scared.” She shot at him, elbowing him gently in the side. “You should worry about yourself.”

He grinned, tipping them both backwards so they were gazing up at the sky, pointing out shapes in the clouds together.

.

“You’ll be taking your sister out tomorrow.” His mother informed him at the dinner table, stabbing violently at her plate. “And you, missy, will be Snoopy.”

Addy smacked her hand down against the surface of the table. “I don’t want to be Snoopy. I want to be a pretty girl! Like Violet.”

His mother’s sour mood flared up. “You’ll go as Snoopy or you won’t go at all.” She turned to Tate. “That girl is a bad influence. My daughter will not be modelin’ herself after your little Violet. You better not be associating yourself with that little she devil. I am through with this childish rebellion of yours; always moping about with that racket you claim is music, in those fallin’ apart clothes.”

Larry smiled at him. “I’m sure you could find better friends to spend your time with. Surely there must be other girls at your school.”

Tate glared at him. “Fuck off!”

“I want to be a pretty girl!” Addy shrieked as she jumped up from her seat and threw her glass of water at the wall, watching it shattered into a thousand little pieces. “Why can’t I be a pretty girl?”

“Because you aren’t!” She howled, her blonde hair falling out of her hair clip. “You aren’t a pretty girl, and you’ll never be one! You’re stuck like this, Adeline. You’ll always be stuck like this, stuck in this house.” His mother grabbed hold on the table cloth tightly, hands clenching tightly around the white fabric. “They see you walking down that street; they think how lucky they are. Lucky that they aren’t you, that they aren’t ruined!”

“Sweetheart, maybe you should calm down.” Larry spoke quietly, watching them with wide eyes. Tate scowled at his weak attempt, gazing at him mother falling apart. The house was quiet around them, breathing anxiously as she kept getting louder and louder. “We can decide on a costume for darling little Addy later.”

She ignored him, continuing on as she seethed at her daughter. “They see me as hero, you know? Every time we walk down the street together, they stare at us. Imagine,” his mother barked, “that if they ever saw Beau. What would they possibly think? My entire family is wrecked you know, and nothing will ever fix it. God, he’s like Frankenstein. ”

Tate looked past his mother and out the window. Violet stood bathed in the darkness watching them. “I can’t take Addy out tomorrow because I have a date.”

Addy turned to him with wide eyes. “Is it Violet?” Her brief display of anger and hurt and been washed away into mere curiosity, intrigued by his quiet news.

His mother turned to him, her eyes dark in the candlelight. “I will peel her skin off them pretty little bones of hers if you dare go near her one more time. This twisted little friendship you two have is over. I swear to the Lord above us, that I will rip her lungs out and crush her pathetic little organ she claims a heart.”

Violet gazed back at him, her face blurred by the reflection of the four of them gathered around the table. “It’s not. Some other girl from school.” He shrugged, tearing her gaze from the pale girl outside in the night to the sharp silver knife sitting next to his plate.

His mother stood up, wobbling on her feet before staggering away towards the sitting room. “Don’t get her pregnant, will you?” She called over her shoulder before vanishing in the darkness of the house.

Addy was still watching him intently from across the table, candlelight flickering across her pale skin. “There is no other girl.” She informs him quietly before leaving the table as well.

Larry poured a glass of wine.

.

“Some other girl, right?” Violet asked the moment his bedroom door was shut. The Rolling Stones was playing, oddly upbeat compared to her usual song preferences. “Is she prettier than me?” She teased him from where she laid on her side, eyes watching him carefully.

He grinned at her, “She’s gorgeous.”

Violet stuck out her tongue at him before standing, hands hidden in the pockets of the oversized sweater, the dark fabric making her look smaller. “Whatever. Wanna playing Scrabble?” Something had clawed her face, leaving behind three crimson cuts across her cheek, looking painfully deep as they forced the side of her mouth to tilt upwards.

Tate carefully touched her chin, forcing her head to tilt upwards. “What bear were you poking with a stick?”

She carefully touched her cheek, flinching when her fingers brushed against the cuts. “Shit. I forgot about that.”

“How do you forget about your flesh slashed into ribbons?”

Violet shrugged. “Easy. You do it all the time. It’ll heal, trust me.”

Tate nodded. “I do.”

She looked confused. “You do what?”

“I trust you.” He shrugged, unable to tear his eyes away from the cuts on her face. “Seriously, what happen to you? You weren’t like this earlier.”

“I was babysitting for someone. Seriously, don’t worry about it.” She smirked at him, smirk looking sharper the way her mouth was tugged upwards. “The kid is a little monster, but he doesn’t have any rabies. You don’t have to worry about that.” Violet winked, taking his hand.

He kissed her carefully, pulling her closer.

.

He remembers when he was younger playing in the basement with a toy truck. He remembers the darkness, space crowded with chandeliers and boxes crammed with items of a lost past. He remembers a face watching him, grey and strange with a leach like mouth, lurching out of the shadows and grabbing him. He remembers surging forward, sliding across the floor crying and trying to escape, feeling death clinging to his skin.

Someone had stopped the monster, wrapping their thin arms around him and stealing him away.

.

Tate slipped on his trench coat before he left the house, barely glancing at Addy wearing a rubber mask over her face. It looked surreal, features unmoving and so obviously fake. His mother leaned against the doorframe, watching Addy twirl about in the front entrance in a bright blue dress. “You be careful now, Jesus H. Christ. Last thing that needs to happen is you runnin’ about into traffic.”

He slammed the door shut behind him as he left, finding Violet across the street sitting on the sidewalk. She was watching the house with a satisfied smirk.

“You’re face looks better.” Tate informs her curious, because there wasn’t a sign that she had ever been attacked.

She rolled her eyes. “Heavy duty concealer.”

Day was fading slowly into night as they walked down the streets, their hands finding each other. “Where do you want to go?” He asked her as they skirted around a rather large cluster of children latched onto one another with pillow cases clutched in their hands.

Violet shrugged. “I think there is a pretty good music store close by, if you want to go. They got some pretty off the cuff stuff, but they’re decent”

They do find the store, looking ancient with dusty windows and creaking floorboards. Tate holds the doors open for Violet and they browse about together, snickering at obscure names. It’s a jumble of cassettes, records and CDs, all piled up together with no form of organization.

Eventually they leave with a bag each of music, stuffing them carefully into Violet’s backpack. “I want to take you somewhere.” Tate tells her quietly, leading her through the small town with small minded people. Part of him wants to smash house windows and kick in store doors. “I found it a week ago when I blew off school.”

He takes her to a beach where the water roars as it hits the sand. The horizon stretches on forever as sandy hills rolled up behind them. Violet kicked her shoes off before running towards the edge of the water. “I love it.” She declared as she turned to face him.

“I’ve wanted to take you here for a while.” Tate shrugged as he drew her closer. The sun was setting, striking the sky red. He loved the way it looked, as if the sun was bleeding. “I wanted to make you smile.”

Violet grabbed his hand and he tugged her further back from the water. “The night is ours, isn’t it?”

She sat down next on the ground before yanking him down next to her, her purple tights looking darker as the sun shrank away. “I wish it could always be like this, you know.”

“It will.” Tate decided quietly as he pulled closer. “It always will. As long as you want me, I’ll be here. I love you, Violet.”

Violet kissed him softly.

.

A group of teenagers stumbled down the little pathway, struggling to maintain their footing as they descended the sandy hills. “That you, Tate?” One demanded as they neared. Tate got up to his feet before helping Violet up. “I heard what you did to Joey, you fucker.”

Five of them end of standing in a group, slutty girls dressed sluttier and jocks glowering darkly at the two. “Who’s this? You drug her or something?” The one girl asked as she tossed her blonde hair over her shoulder. “Or is she so fucked up she doesn’t care that you’re a freak.”

Violet rolled her eyes. “What are you supposed to be anyways, a hooker?” She asked as she took in the mini skirt and boot combo. “Get out of my face.”

“Seriously, get out of here. It’s a big beach.” Tate shrugged as he pushed himself slightly in front of Violet.

“What the hell did you do to him?” Demanded one of the jocks that he dimly recognized as the quarterback for the football team. “Joey’s become a nutcase. Claiming his hair is turning white from fear and shit. He goes on and on about the bible, claiming that he’s seen the devil. You did something freaky, and you’re going to fix him.”

He rolled his eyes. “What the fuck do you think I did? I gave him some coke. He just couldn’t handle it.”

“Tell you what, because you ruined Joey, we’re going to ruin your pretty little slut.” The other boy smirked, lurching forward and grabbing Violet by the wrist. “We’re going to carve up her face and make her cry. What do you say, Mike? Transform her into the next Black Dahlia? Bet she wouldn’t be a good screw if we ripped her in half.”

She cried out before kicking his ankle hard and grabbing his arm and bit down hard. He screamed as he ripped his arm out of her grip. Violet spit out blood. “Don’t touch her!” Tate shouted as he shoved the boy backwards.

“She’s fucking mental!”

Within one smooth movement Violet ducked down to grab her black backpack before punching him hard in the gut. “Come on, Tate!”

Together they sprinted, stumbling up the sandy hill with the five others struggling after them. “What are you doing?” He hissed as they managed to get to the top, grabbing hold of her arm to pull her up.

“Just keep running. I’ll distract them. Meet you back to at the house, alright?” She shoved him hard before turning towards their pursuers. “Hey fuckers! Wanna go for a run in the park?” Violet frowned at him before pushing him again to get him out of the way before sprinting the opposite direction, spewing insults the entire way.

Tate watched as she ran, long hair looking near silver in the moonlight.

.

“Are you okay?” He demanded the moment she slipped into his room and shut the door softly. “What happened?”

“Bitches couldn’t keep up.” Violet grinned as she picked up a piece of chalk. “It’s fine. I lost them when I ran through the cemetery. They got spooked or something.” She slowly wrote on the black chalkboard pinned to his wall, her neat script spelling out three words. “Idiots.”

Tate sat down on his bed, watching her throw her bag down by his desk before sorting through his growing collection of music. “Did he hurt you? I swear to god, I’ll break his neck.”

She gave him a look. “You can’t hurt him. It’s fine, anyways. It probably won’t even bruise.”

Violet sat down next to him. “I don’t want you to be hurt. I could have killed him when he touched you.” Tate grabbed her arm gently and pulled her closer. “I never want you to be hurt.”

He took the flower from where it lay on the other side of him and passed it to her. He had painted a rose black earlier, remembering her distaste of normal things.

“No one has ever given me a flower before.” She smiled at him softly.

 _I love you_ was scrawled over the chalkboard.

.

He liked to surprise Violet with flowers every day after that Halloween date.

.

Tate’s jacket ended up on the dusty floor of the basement, Violet’s grey tights dangled over the railing. They are surrounded by boxes filled with pieces of lives long gone and it’s the most comforting feeling he’s ever experienced.

.

Beau died of natural causes, his mother had claimed.

He doesn’t quite understand why that damn red little ball rolls down the hallways towards him and how at night he can still hear that chain slide across the attic floor as if he had never died.

.

School was an agonizingly dull process that Tate preferred to skip.

After Halloween the five students had branched out and gathered more followers who were determined to make things right, leering at him in the hallways and shoving him into lockers. He hated everyone and wanted nothing more than to crush their skulls beneath his heel.

So he stopped going.

His mother never noticed his presence in the house and Larry never said anything when he heard the music playing loudly from his bedroom. Every morning he found Violet asleep next to him, one hand grasping tightly to his shirt in her sleep. He liked the feel of her in his arms and watching her sleep.

They rarely left his room and if they did, it was to go smoke cigarettes near the back of the property where no one would be able to catch sight of them.

“Do you ever just want to leave?” Violet asked quietly one day as she leaned against the towering trees that sheltered him. His mother was outdoor overseeing the placement of a gazebo, gazing coolly at the construction being built. “Just throw everything away and get out of here?”

“Every day.”

Violet took his hands and pulled him closer. “I want you to get out of here.”

He grinned. “Come with me then. We can steal my mom’s money and take Larry’s car. We can go anywhere you want. Boston?” Tate knows she misses Boston, misses her home. He wonders sometimes if she really misses it or if she misses what it had been once, her family together before they all crumbled apart.

She shook her head. “No, I can’t leave. But you can. You should go while you still can.” Violet wasn’t looking at him anymore but rather at the house. “You shouldn’t be here anymore.”

“Are you high or something? I’m not leaving you. I love you, Violet. I don’t give a fuck about these people; I just want to be with you forever.”

The house blocked out the sun, casting its shadow across the yard.

“I want you to go. Before it is too late. Please, Tate. You’re a good person. You don’t deserve to get caught here. I want you to go before it’s too late, because you don’t even understand what is going on. You need to go. So go. Stop staying and just pack your shit up. Get the hell out of this place!”

Tate turned around as he ran his hands through his hair. “I’m not leaving without you. I’m never going to leave you.”

When he turned back around, Violet was gone.

.

He carved their initials into the tree before realizing he never knew her last name. So he gives her his last name instead.

.

Violet left behind a painful gap in his life.

He couldn’t stop looking for her, always seeking out a glimpse of her faded dresses and pale skin except she was never there. Moments were that he could have sworn she was watching him through mirrors but whenever he turned to look closer he could only find himself.

“You act like you’ve lost something.” Moira informed him as she scrubbed the counter. He was seated at the island, glaring at the silver toaster. Tate could see a blur of brown hair before it faded into red. “Your mother is concerned.”

Tate frowned. “I don’t care.”

She smiled thinly. “Good. Just, do be careful. This house has a nasty habit of taking things on you.”

“Have you seen Violet lately?” He eventually asked her as he looked out the window. The yard looked dead, lawn turning brown and leaves beginning to wilt. Winter was slowly creeping into the neighbourhood. “She hasn’t been around.”

Moira took out the kettle and began preparing tea. “You’ll find that the people you look for the most will always be out of sight. I’m certain Violet is close by.”

Except she wasn’t.

The tea burned his tongue.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered and he wasn’t really sure why.

.

Tate wanted to scream.

.

The house was empty.

He was going mad, listening to the house laugh at him.

People in photographs were shifting in their frames, lights blinking on and off. Doors were slamming shut and all he could hear was the house roaring.

“I’m sorry but I really must insist that you wait here. I cannot possibly allow you to be there during the procedure.” A man informed him coolly, his face grey. “My wife must be prepping your girlfriend.”

Tate gapped at the man dressed as a doctor. “Who the fuck are you? Get out of my house!”

He looked confused. “This is your house?”

Tate stumbled away only to trip over a child lying across the floor with her face clawed at. Something howled from the basement. “What the hell is this?” he whispered as he staggered away and into the dining room. “Wake up, wake up!” He shouted in frustration, punching the wall.

“You’re not dreaming, you know.”

The woman with dark hair lay out on the table, dark black hair falling over her shoulders. The white dahlia in her hair looked almost grey in the gloom of the house, tainted and ruined. She gave a cry as her torso and lower half suddenly split in half, intestines spilling out over the surface of the dark wood table that Moira had scrubbed. “Has the doctor seen you yet? Has he given you a grin yet?” She sobbed, stretching out a hand to him. He flinched at the sight of her Glasgow smile.

“What are you doing here?” A red haired maid asked him, her eyes tracing over his form. He remembered her vaguely from when he was child, traipsing around the house in her black uniform. “Shouldn’t you be playing with your toys, little boy?” the glimpse of naked skin between her dark skirt and tights. Her bright eyes as they watched him, biting her lip as she leaned against the doorframe.

Tate tripped out of the room, shrinking back from the sight of a woman with skin flaking away into ash. “I just wanted him to feel my pain!” She hissed, words turning into smoke. “He left me for her, wanting that vile woman to move into my home.” The woman latched onto his arm, yanking him closer. Her touch burned his skin. “Can you see me now?”

People were slipping out of the walls, hands reaching up out of the floorboards. The house was screaming and pulsing, life flowing through its hallways. “Get away from me!” Tate shouted, yanking himself free from her fiery touch and took the paper weight that sat just within reach and bashed her skull in. “Stop it!”

The woman fell to the ground, wood scorching beneath her. Someone was screaming as the grabbed him, shaking him roughly. “Tater-Tot!” A man grinned wildly at him, revealing sharp teeth and frantic eyes. “Does your mother know you’re here?”

He didn’t pause for a moment, striking down the too familiar man. His neck looked strange, twisted as he lay in a heap at Tate’s feet. Within seconds the man’s eyes had opened again as his hand began reaching for him. “Just die! Stay fucking dead!” Tate roared as he kicked the older man hard in the chest. Bones crunched beneath his blow.

“What are you doing?” Nora whispered, gazing at him from across the room. She looked lost in the swarm of people crowding around him as they tried to grab hold of him. “We’re suffering here. Can’t you see us?”

The old mirror that hung on the wall revealed Violet gliding up the stairs. She didn’t glance towards him, didn’t say a word. He called for her, trying to fight past the swarm of limbs and sheer force. When the people didn’t get out of his way he killed them. He killed them relentlessly, blood splattering over the floorboards in a way that felt purifying. Children laid in twisted heaps on the ground, men gazing up at the ceiling with glassy eyes as women fell to their knees pleading.

“Violet!” He screamed as he fought past a woman with sharp nails and long hair, a bloody smile across her throat dripping blood.

“There is death everywhere,” Nora whispered, her voice finding its way to his ears despite the shrieks that clung to the air. “My baby died, and _he_ broke the rules. He’s the reason why the house can’t sleep, why we can’t rest.”

He crawled up the stairs, leaving smears of blood behind. The house felt like it was spinning wildly out of control as he fought his way up the stairwell. He could hear the roar of the water filling the tub, loud music echoing through the house. “Violet, help me!”

Tate glanced over his shoulder and saw the rooms filled with bodies twisted unnaturally. Nora was stepping carefully over the bodies and looking around furniture. Some of the figures were twitching, slowly sitting up. He pushed himself up the last of the stairs, slowly managing to get up to his feet as he leaned against the wall.

The water stopped.

.

He found her in the bathroom with her wrists slit.

She didn’t wake up when he pleaded her to live.

.

Tate ran through the house, searching for a way out. He could hear people calling for him, pleading with him to see them the way they were. Beautifully broken, the way victims forged through pain and hell. He flung himself into the attic, lurching up the little ladder and tripping in his haste to escape the madness because _nothing was making any sense_.

He fell into a heap of boxes, contents spilling out over the ground. Purple tights and old records scattered around him, the messy scrawl of _Violet_ marking the box.

Darkness engulfed him.

.

His mother was holding his hand when he woke up, face dark in the shadows. Night had fallen, wrapping itself around the house in a sullen way. “What were you doing up in the attic?” She asked him quietly, running her fingers through her hair.

Tate remembered the man shaking him frantically, how he gazed out of old photographs that his mother had forgotten to burn.

“I was,” he swallowed, shutting his eyes. “looking around.”

“Moira found blood in the stairwell. Were you attacked when we were gone? You have a nasty bump on your head.”

He had forgotten that his mother could be a mother, touching his forehead gently and whispering softly. “I don’t know. I don’t know, nothing is making sense. None of it does.”

She shushed him as she carefully adjusted his blankets. “Don’t you start worrying yourself. You need proper rest, none of this stress. You just stay put and let momma take care of you, will you? I’ll get you right as rain again, you’ll see. You’re just needin’ proper sleep and some good meals. That’s all you need.”

“She was there, in the tub. Did you see her?”

His mother furrowed her brow. “See who? You aren’t making any sense. Right now you just need to sleep.”

“That box though, it was Violet’s.” Tate squeezed his eyes shut. He remembered her in the bathtub with blood smeared across the floor. Her blood had looked like an explosion against the white towels and cream coloured towels. “What happened?”

She stood up from the chair. “She must have left the box behind when her family moved.”

.

_“The darkness will make you crave it, make you do things you shouldn’t ever do.”_

_“How do you know so much about this place?”_

_“I did my research.”_

.

The internet was lying, he decided as he fought his way past each of the images. Vivian Harmon, famous cellist, had been taken away to an asylum. Teenage suicide, found the bathtub empty, water dark pink. Body missing.

Her school picture glared at him, her dark eyes flashing across the screen as she stood in front of a blue screen with her arms crossed defensively. She looked barely restrained in the image, her smile more of a scowl.

“No,” he whispered, clicking past the images and further into the history. Suicide murder accident suicide murder accident-everything was just so tragic! the one neighbour claimed. “She’s alive, Violet was just here!”

“She was.” A soft voice came from behind him, Nora standing nervously in his shadow with her lace handkerchief clutched tight in her grip. “Violet has been trapped here, the way we all are. She knew it the moment she stepped foot in the house. We’ve been watching the world drift by, waiting to be released.”

He stood from his chair slowly, his legs trembling. “Is there release?”

Nora gave him a sad smile. “Only hell. They took my baby for what we did. Or what I did, I forced him to do those awful things to those girls, you know. I just thought it would help. They wouldn’t be in trouble anymore, and the bills would finally be paid. Except, we’re still paying for it. _I’m_ still paying for it.” She gazed forlornly around the room. “My baby isn’t my baby anymore.”

Tate glanced at the chalkboard on the wall; _I love you_ still written across the surface in a loud print. “I remember you, when I was younger. You watched the birds with me, when mom was drunk.”

“I do love birds,” She whispered as she stepped closer, placing her one hand gently on his shoulder. “They can fly away whenever the world gets loud. Except, we’ve all had our wings clipped. Mortality was fleeting before we even realized.”

She vanished, her pale hair and golden dress swallowed by the dimness of his room, his computer screen making the shadows thicker.

Violet’s eyes looked dark in her school picture.

.

“I didn’t want you to know.” She told him quietly as he sat at his desk. He couldn’t stop looking at the image enlarged on his laptop. “God, I hated that picture.”

“I like it.” Tate whispered. “You could have told me.”

Violet stood behind him quietly. “I wanted you to get out of here. I thought you’d be able to, that you would find your way out. Why couldn’t you just leave?”

He shrugged. “I can’t leave here without you. Why couldn’t you have come with me?”

“I’m dead, Tate. I’ve been dead for a couple of years now, I think. I don’t really know anymore. Time doesn’t really function here the way it does when you’re alive. I can never leave this house.”

“Halloween.” He swallowed. “You left Halloween.”

That remembered her then, running in the moonlight. The way she stood at the edge of the water, tights and long skirt and the way she spoke. She had never seemed so alive until that moment, burning in the darkness.

Violet gently brushed her hand against his shoulder. “Halloween is the only night that the dead can walk free.”

Her words feel like they’re burning themselves to his skin, tattooing themselves to his skull. He can’t really see anything anymore beyond her image, a reflection of her caught in the moment when she was still alive and not dead, body still breathing with blood pumping through her veins and not rotting in some casket seven feet beneath the ground.

“You left me. How could you just leave like that?” He forced himself not to cry. “I love you, Violet, and you just left me and wouldn’t come back. And then I found you in the bathtub, dead. You weren’t waking up and the house was coming to life and you weren’t there.”

“I wanted to give you your best chance.” She sobbed. “I’m so sorry.”

He stood up from his chair and grabbed her, yanking her tightly into his grip. “You are my best chance, Violet. I love you, please don’t leave me again.”

“No, Tate. I’m never going to leave. I love you.”

.

“You seem better, Tate.” Doctor Harmon stated blankly. “How have you been sleeping?”

Tate shrugged. “Better. Violet came back.” He feels sickeningly satisfied with the way pain flickers across his therapist’s face. “We made up.”

“What happened between you and Violet?”

He grinned savagely at the man. He hates them, especially when Violet told him her entire story. How he threw her mother away when she tried to leave the house, how his girlfriend continued to attack Vivian again and again, and how he had done nothing. “Her dad is an asshole. He messed up her and her mom pretty bad. She’s better now.”

The man looks like he’s going to cry. It took him a few moments to regain his usual weary composure.  “Some people make mistakes, Tate. It’s not a good thing to hold grudges. Tell me, though. How have you been doing lately?”

“Fine. The sex helps.”

He doesn’t like being this crude, this rough. He does however like making the doctor squirm in his seat, Violet’s smirking gaze peering out at him from the reflection caught in the framed photographs.

“How has school been?”

“Idiotic. I just want to blow everyone up. Kill them, you know?”

Doctor Harmon attempted several more questions before relenting, handing over a new prescription of pills that they both know he won’t take.

.

“Why did you come back?” Tate asked Violet eventually, setting aside his book because there is something sickeningly lurching in his chest that screams at him he’s living a lie. “After, the house came to life. You were gone because you wanted me to go. Except, you came back.”

Violet looks at him with wide eyes.

Tate continues on, standing up from his chair. “Please tell me?”

“You already know, though.” She sighed, taking his hand carefully. “I’m sorry.”

He gives a jerky nod. “I’m dead.”

Now that he’s said the forbidden words, everything seems so painful. The glass windows looked barred over, the doors look wielded shut. The air tastes stale, but he figures everything will be alright because they’re together now.

Like Romeo and Juliet, except she hates Shakespeare and he hates that love story.

Violet looked terrified. “I didn’t want you to die.”

“I don’t remember dying. Was it one of the ghosts?”

She nodded. “Not in the way you think. You died in the attic, poisoned.”

“Where is my body then?”

.

As they stand in the crawl space side by side all he can think of is the Bell Jar and taking sleeping pills one by one.

.

“Moira slipped something in your tea.” Violet whispered as she took his hand. “She dragged your body down here to hide you. Your mother killed her years ago and she wanted revenge. You were her revenge.”

He fell to his knees. “I’m dead.”

He’s alright with it, but the realization that he’ll never leave the Murder House crushes his spine and tattoos his entire existence into the foundation of the damned mansion.

Violet began to cry. “I’m sorry, Tate. I wanted you to live so badly, but then you weren’t. I wanted you to be free, not chained to this goddamn house. I’m so sorry.”

“I didn’t realize I was dead. How could I not notice?”

“My parents never realized. My dad had my mom taken away and then he sold the place to some family. Larry’s family. He thought I ran away and never bothered to look for him. Some of the other ghosts hid my body down here. I never meant to kill myself; I just wanted them to see me. What they had done to me.”

The crawlspace felt like it was humming, his body twisted up in the shadows. Flies were crawling over his corspe and all that he could see were the remains of another body wearing old converse and a thin shirt that was falling apart. “Is that you?” he gaped at the form, blackened skin rotting still. “Down here? You should be buried properly, not down here. Unknown.”

Violet shrugged. “Maybe. My dad’s still alive. He might like to know, really know. But I’m okay with it, being down here with you.”

Their hands were just inches apart.

.

Addie understands, when he tells her everything. Midnight is the magical hour, Violet tells him. That’s when carriages turn back into pumpkins and ghosts become their strongest. She can see through his appearance and understand everything.

“Leave, get out of here.” Tate smiled at her softly as he whispered the devils words in her ear. “Please, Addie.”

She knows what she has to do.

.

Larry burns in his office chair after she delivers a letter, and she fires a round into their mother when she crosses the street just outside their home.

Then she swallows a bullet safe in her bedroom surrounded by her dolls.

.

“I wish I could make this up to you.” Moira tells him softly, shrinking away from him. She looks terrified as she stands before him, pressed against the cabinets. “I had to ruin her, the way she ruined me.”

“Get the fuck out of my way.”

They don’t talk after that.

.

Vivian stands in the entrance of the house, hair cut short and looking small in the general darkness of the mansion. “Violet?” She called out softly as she peered up the stairwell.

Violet appeared just a few feet away from her mother, looking uncertain in her converse and black dress. “What are you doing here?”

“Tate sent your father a letter demanding my release. Things are different now.” She whispered, stepping a little closer to her dead daughter. “I’m so sorry, Violet. I never thought you would have died here. I thought he would have taken you away.”

She shrugged, flinching away. “You guys were busy. You had just lost the baby and dad was screwing some twenty year old. I get it.”

“I never lost my baby, Violet.”

With that she allows her mother to pull her into her arms and cling to her. “I missed you.” She whispers in Vivian’s shoulder, squeezing her eyes shut. “I want to go home with you.”

“We are home, believe it or not.”

Tate watches from the top of the stairs.

.

Vivian owns the house in the end.

Violet threatens the ghosts if they even revealed their presence to her. Tate ripped apart the ones that did.

.

A gay couple buy the house next door and Vivian never needs a security system and somehow everything works out in the end.

.

“I love you,” Violet whispered to Tate as they gazed up at the ceiling. “I want you to know that.

“I love you.”

.

_No one ever listens,_

_this wallpaper glistens_

.


End file.
